Friday, 5 May 2017

Flag gate (someone obviously shoved it up) Updated

The gist of a clip from this morning's Today programme, as highlighted on the Today website, featuring John McDonnell "putting a brave face" on labour's disastrous results in the May 4th elections.

J.M.:

"During an election we get balanced air-time throughout broadcast media. As a result of this people can hear more about our policies and also more about our candidates and more about our leader."

Nick Robinson:

"Are you saying the more they see of Mr. Corbyn, the more people will like him and want him to be our next P.M.?"

J.M.:

"I think they can make a fair judgement and what they're finding is, is that what comes across is that people like the policies and then they see Jeremy Corbyn is honest, decent and also principled, and that's the sort of leader many of them want, so the more air time we get the better. It's the unbalanced reporting - the more people see of Jeremy the more they think - this is the leader I want"

Somewhat abruptly, the clip ends. Another way of defining 'principled' is intransigent. Personally, I do not agree that Jeremy Corbyn is decent or honest - I see him as more of a dunce. A short tempered dunce. But what do I know?

Toddle off to the full'listen again' Today programme, to hear the part of the interview where Nick Robinson questions McDonnell about his May Day speech delivered while standing in front of that flag. Those flags actually. The Mail Online has saved me the trouble of detailing it:

"Someone obviously shoved it up"

"Mr. McDonnell, asked if he knew he was standing in front of banners with the Communist hammer and sickle, and also representing Syrian president Bashar Assad's regime, told BBC radio 4's Today: "No, of course I didn't know.

"It was a TUC march. It was a TUC May Day celebration. I was there to celebrate May Day, which was a celebration of the contribution workers make to our economy."

Asked if he would have insisted on the banners being removed if he had known about them, Mr McDonnell said: "Of course I would, my goodness yeah.

"It was only afterwards - the TUC organisers didn't know they were there, someone had obviously shoved them up, I was furious afterwards and I think so were the organisers themselves.

"We're talking about the Trades Union Congress. It isn't an organisation that backs any of these sort of movements. That's appalling."

Hmm. Nick Robinson said:

"you're a well-known radical - you've talked about the limits of doing it through the ballot box, is this not who you really are?

"Look, I'm a Trade Unionist" said the shadow chancellor evasively, and reiterated, at length, the Labour party's promise to create a fairer society. When he had finished, Nick Robinson turned to Laura Kuenssberg whom the BBC has on permanent standby to interpret the politics for the benefit of the intellectually challenged listener. She said it was a masterclass in 'brave-facery' and proceeded to analyse the ongoing results. Flag-gate was not mentioned again.

4 comments:

I assume McDonnell also had no knowledge of the philosophy espoused by a certain red book he brandished and threw at George Osborne in Parliament. But of course I forgot, that was just a joke to draw attention to the sales of British assets to the Chinese government. I am curious to know if anyone actually believes him.This is the man who would be Chancellor of the Exchequer.

John McDonnell on Marr this morning. Guess what wasn't mentioned. Of course, bringing it up would be more anti-Corbyn bias, right?

It was mostly a soft ride, only gentle probing which allowed McDonnell to do his friendly grandfather routine (he's very good at it, makes it difficult to hate him. even though he is loathsome). Marr did, though, try to get him on a gotcha by saying he would be the first Marxist Chancellor. McDonnell initially tried to dodge it and referred to himself as Socialist, but Marr soon tried to get a yes or no answer to "Are you a Marxist?" More dancing around, so Marr tried the Das Kapital angle about destroying capitalist society. McDonnell very easily continued to dance around it with more of the friendly grandfather routine, he cares only about fairness, a society where everyone prospers, etc.